THE Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board has apprehended another Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) candidate, Cletus Kokowa, for upgrading his score from 162 to 206 with the help of a fraudster.
Kokowa became the second candidate to be apprehended by the board following that of Adah Eche who was nabbed last month for similar offense.
Kokowa confessed before the management of the board on Thursday that he was asked to pay N10,000 for the upgrading.
The board told reporters that the candidate, with Registration Number 95329290ED from Bayelsa State, contacted the syndicate through a WhatsApp group a few weeks ago where he was told his score could be upgraded from 162.
It explained that fraudsters later sent a fake result screen shot to Kokowa, stating that his score was now 206.
However, when the result remained unchanged on the JAMB site, Kokowa’s father, Garen Kokowa, wrote a letter of complaint to the board asking for the rectification of his son’s scores.
In the letter of complaint addressed to the JAMB Registrar, Prof Is-haq Oloyede, the suspect’s father wrote, “Your inability for swift response to address the issue has led to my son’s forfeiture of his Nigerian Defence Academy admission opportunity.
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“However, I am craving your indulgence to quickly rectify the result in affirmative to enable him have a good stand for his second choice of institution.”
The board thereafter invited Kokowa to come with the two results as a proof, after which he confessed on Thursday to have employed a syndicate.
His uncle, an army officer, who declined to give his name, accompanied Kokowa to the JAMB headquarters.
The boy was afterwards handed over to the NSCDC officers.
Kokowa said, “Those guys sent a mail to me that they could help me to upgrade my score. I then sent them my Registration number and e-mail. When the results were out and I checked, they showed me 206. Then, one of them called me asking me to pay them the money.
“I later went to check and I found 162. I was confused. I had heard that upgrading scores was an offence but I didn’t really believe it. I did not tell my daddy and my uncle about the syndicate.”
The JAMB Registrar, Oloyede, said the board would ensure the arrest and prosecution of candidates discovered to be involved in fraudulent practices before, during and after the examination